


If it's the last thing I do then it's worth it

by winter_hiems



Category: X-Men (Comicverse), X-Men - All Media Types, X-Men Legacy
Genre: Ableism, Amnesia, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Autistic David Haller, Blind Character, Canon Autistic Character, Canon Disabled Character, Canon Jewish Character, Dissociation, Dissociative Identity Disorder, Don't copy to another site, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/M, Fake Character Death, Feelings, Hurt/Comfort, Intimacy, Kissing, Memory Loss, Mental Health Issues, Non-Sexual Intimacy, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Trauma, Temporary Amnesia, Tenderness, Trauma, canon blind character, temporary memory loss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-20
Updated: 2021-02-20
Packaged: 2021-03-17 06:55:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29588943
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winter_hiems/pseuds/winter_hiems
Summary: A train derailed leaving all the passengers dead. This wouldn’t seem strange, except for the fact that most of the dead don’t have a single mark on their bodies.Trying to piece together what happened through CCTV footage, Abigail Brand puts together a list of four suspects.The sticking point? One of those suspects is David Haller. David Haller, who is meant to be dead.(An X-Men The Bifrost Incident AU)
Relationships: Ruth Aldine/David Haller
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	1. The Train

It was meant to be a luxury train. 

Spacious cars filled with fine furniture and tasteful decorations. For each journey, the young and the beautiful would present their tickets and file in, taking their seats. Over the next three days, they would travel past some of the most isolated, beautiful parts of northern Canada, accompanied by every luxury. 

It was meant to be a luxury train. It wasn’t anymore. 

For its last journey, after it failed to arrive once the usual three days had passed, search parties had been sent out. 

The train had derailed at least a day into its journey, though exact timings weren’t clear since they didn’t yet know how fast the train had been moving compared to its usual speed. It had rolled down an incline, coming to rest in a valley, wrecked beyond all repair. The passengers and crew were all dead. Some had clearly got smashed up in the fall, but most of them had died without a mark on their bodies, faces fixed in expressions of horror. 

Which meant that this was something to do with mutants. Which meant that it was Abigail Brand’s job to figure out what the fuck had happened. Hundreds dead – hundreds of rich people dead – so the pressure was on to find the culprit. 

If there had been anyone left alive after the crash then the heavy snow had hidden the trail they’d left, and Brand didn’t rate their chances at survival in the wilderness of the Canadian winter. 

Given the total lack of witnesses, she was reduced to combing through the CCTV footage, looking for signs of what had gone wrong. Even if it weren’t for the strange deaths of the passengers, the fact that there was no sign of engine failure or a fault in the track would have caught the attention of the authorities. 

There was no reason for the train to have derailed. So Abigail combed through the footage, and searched for the saboteur. 

There had been a frankly ridiculous number of cameras on the train. Not just in the main cars, but in individual compartments. After checking the train’s schematics, Abigail was sure that most of the cameras had been added after the train was officially completed, and an examination of the wreckage showed that the cameras in the compartments had been hidden. 

Someone had wanted to be able to see every inch of the train. 

*

At first it had just been hours of watching Instagram influencers take selfies, but in the end, her first suspect was easy to find. 

Amahl Farouk was an old man, and easily recognisable in the footage as he boarded the train and made his way to the back. The last room on the train had a glass wall, offering prime views of the landscape as it passed. 

With him, assistants had brought computers and set up monitors, until it was clear that Farouk was the one doing the watching. 

Whatever he’d been up to couldn’t have been good. And yet, Brand couldn’t quite believe that he was the one who’d derailed the train. He could have killed the passengers; something like that was definitely his style. But the way he watched the monitors was too expectant. He’d been planning something for this train, something that depended on it remaining intact. All that equipment wouldn’t have been brought aboard by a man planning to destroy the very train he was travelling in, and Farouk wasn’t physically resilient enough to survive a crash like that. He had to be at least eighty, probably well past ninety. 

But then again, his body had not been found among the wreckage. 

*

Going through the private compartments one by one, Brand found her second suspect. 

David. Fucking. Haller. 

Well, that seemed to answer the question of ‘who derailed this huge locomotive’. If anyone was powerful and crazy enough to do something like that, it was him. In all likelihood, the rest of Abigail’s time would just be fast-forwarding through the footage until the moment he decided to destroy the train. 

It had probably just been one of his alters. God knows there were enough of them to do the deed. 

But still, if he’d been in his right mind when he did it, then Abigail was interested to see why. She’d always found Haller deeply infuriating, but when he was lucid enough, he always had a plan. Elaborate Xanatos Gambits within Xanatos Gambits, always ending up with David on top even when such a thing didn’t seem possible. 

How would derailing a train have benefitted him? Did he know that one of his greatest enemies was only a few cars back, watching him on a hidden camera? 

There was also the fact that David Haller was meant to be dead. It had been public and messy, and very little of the body had been left. 

Why would he have faked his own death? Any number of reasons. Could the faked death have had something to do with this train? It had been years ago. But then again, he always had been one for planning ahead. 

The more Abigail watched Haller sitting there alone, the more she realised that this wasn’t a trademark David Haller Plan. When she’d first seen him, he’d been pacing, and she’d assumed it meant that he was scheming, but now it was clear that the steps had been more like a trapped animal circling its cage. 

Fast forwarding, he spent most of the next few hours curled up in the corner of the compartment, clutching his head, occasionally rocking backwards and forwards. Zooming in, he looked awful. Exhausted and emaciated. The only audio she could pick up was a wordless, quiet keening. 

There was no way he could have got onto that train and into the compartment under his own steam. 

Abigail wound the footage back, until she saw Haller being shoved into the compartment by a pair of hired goons. The same hired goons who’d set up Farouk’s equipment. 

So Farouk had wanted David Haller on this train ride with him. He’d probably also been responsible for David’s not-death, subsequent disappearance, and current lack of lucidity. Farouk been planning something, and he needed Haller for that plan to work. 

Still, given David’s mental state, he could definitely have been the one who destroyed the train. 

*

He had memories. He knew they were in there somewhere, but every time he tried to find them, the screaming drowned them out. 

The clearest thoughts were of sunlight, and felt happy, but he knew that wasn’t all of it. There was a darkness in him, a darkness he couldn’t pin down. It was smothered in vagueness. 

There was so much he needed to find. What was it? What was he looking for? 

Whatever it was, it was buried deep. 

Sometimes he thought he could see a man. Was the man himself? Was it? Perhaps the man was only a dream. 

The man was screaming but he couldn’t make a sound. Was it rage? Was the man angry because he was trapped somewhere? Was he trying to break out to do something? It must be something important. 

So much of his memories had been lost somewhere, and he needed to find them. 

His head was empty. There were missing pieces, he knew there were, but he didn’t know what they were. He knew his mind wasn’t meant to be this empty. 

Bright flashes in his mind. Too bright, they drowned everything else out. Was this him? Was this who he was? Who was he? 

Sometimes he caught a glimpse, people dying harsh, bloody deaths. Had he killed them? Who had killed them? 

Two men had locked him in here. A small room that rocked gently. 

Tears were streaming down his face. He didn’t know why he was crying, maybe it was just the confusion. 

He had to put himself back together. Repair the pieces of his soul. He didn’t know how. 

Another bright flash in his mind. He winced. 

Where had his sanity gone? 

No, he couldn’t let them – whoever they were, whoever had done this to him – he couldn’t let them win. Couldn’t let them erase him, couldn’t let them take him apart. 

The door to the room opened. 

A man looked down at him. The man was older than him, or at least, he thought so. He couldn’t remember how old he was. The man was wearing a strange red visor. 

*

Abigail leaned forward and stared at the computer screen. What the hell was Scott Summers doing on board? 

Rewinding the footage, she tranced his movements; he’d snuck onto the train, then spent the rest of the time discreetly searching it, using a master key to get into the places that other passengers couldn’t. 

Brand had barely heard anything about Summers since the X-Men had disbanded. Was he here for Haller, or for Farouk? 

She returned to the section of footage where Summers stood over Haller’s trembling form, and pressed play. 

*

“That’s not possible,” Scott muttered to himself. 

Below him, Legion didn’t even react to the sound. Scott was no telepath, but it didn’t take an expert to see that Haller was a hollow shell of what he’d once been. 

How was he alive? Scott had seen him die. Blood everywhere. 

And fuck, he’d never liked Legion, but he didn’t deserve this. Whatever had been done to break his mind, he was in obvious distress. 

Farouk must have been behind it. He’d boarded this train wanting to find out what Farouk was planning, and to stop it if he could. In the past the Shadow King had tried to take Legion over as his new host. Had Scott stumbled upon a second attempt? And what the hell had happened to leave Haller like this? 

Whatever Farouk’s plan, Scott knew that the stakes had just been raised now that Legion was part of it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I like to give David autonomy in my fics, but for the sake of the plot he’s a complete mess here. He can’t even remember his own name.
> 
> Abigail and Scott both think about David and Ruth with a certain degree of ableism, including the fact that Scott thinks of David as Legion.
> 
> This fic is set in the future: the X-Men are disbanded, though mutants still face a certain degree of discrimination. David and Ruth are in their late twenties, Scott and Abigail are in their fifties.
> 
> Since this fic is based off the album The Bifrost Incident, I’m listing the songs that relate to each chapter in the notes. Songs that are especially significant are in bold.
> 
> Songs: Black Box, Odin, **Cold Case** , **Loki** , Person of Interest.
> 
> A list of the characters that parallel each other in this AU:
> 
> Abigail Brand – Lyfrassir Edda  
> David Haller – Loki  
> Ruth Aldine – Sigyn  
> Amahl Farouk – Odin  
> Scott Summers – Thor
> 
> The title is taken from the song Losing Track, from The Bifrost Incident.
> 
> Comments and kudos are always welcome <3
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not own the characters. I am not making money from this work.


	2. Discovery

The compartment door opened. Two train guards stood there. 

One of them spoke with Farouk’s voice. 

“Summers. You’re coming with us.” 

Scott raised his hand to his visor. 

“Really? You’re going to hurt an innocent person? Besides, if you act up, I might just kill a few passengers in retaliation.” 

It was enough to make Scott hesitate, and then they had grabbed him. They marched him to the back of the train, where Farouk was waiting. 

He looked awful. Aged and decrepit, his whole body sagged. Behind him, the computer monitors showed the interior of the whole train. 

“I know I don’t really need a security system,” said Amahl Farouk, talking through his own mouth this time, “But I like to be thorough. Even then, I can’t look at all the screens, all the time. Why, you were on this train for hours before I saw you on the CCTV.” 

“What’s the plan?” asked Scott. “Are you trying to take over Legion’s body again?” 

Farouk smiled. “Actually, yes. I tried once, when he was a boy, and the X-Men came after me, so I failed. After they disbanded, I tried again. I hoped that civilian life might have made Haller’s defences grow soft, but alas, he fought just as hard. So hard that he drove himself even further away from sanity than he already was. It made him much more manageable, so I faked his death and took him captive, resolving to try again. His mental shields are harder than diamond, and I knew I’d never be able to get in without a significant power boost. Hence, this train. A few bribes, and it was all mine.” 

Farouk waved a hand, gesturing to their surroundings. “Over a hundred of the young and the healthy, travelling through a wilderness remote enough that nobody will figure out what I’m doing in time to stop me. Well, nobody that hadn’t already got on the train, and last I heard, most of your friends were dead. So now that I’ve caught you, there’s nobody left to stop me from consuming the souls of everyone on this train, and using the power to break Legion’s defences like a battering ram. Still, I must check that you really are alone. What kind of telepathy shield are you wearing?” 

At this, Scott smiled grimly. “You can’t take it off. It’s built into my visor, and if you remove it – let’s just say that I won’t give you the courtesy of keeping my eyes closed.” 

Farouk’s mouth twitched in disappointment. “Well, I suppose that I’ll have to take it on faith that you haven’t brought company. You will be escorted to one of the more _secure_ compartments, and locked in there for the rest of the trip. You’re not a young man anymore, Mr Summers. When it comes to food, your soul carries little value for me. But once I have Legion’s body, killing you will be an excellent way to experiment with my new powers. Enjoy the remainder of your journey.” 

*

The more Abigail thought about it, the more she decided that Farouk had killed the passengers. It had to be either him or Haller, and Farouk had explicitly said that he was going to consume the passengers’ souls. Which led to the possibility that somewhere, right now, Amahl Farouk was on the loose. He might be lying low after taking over Legion’s body, but even if he hadn’t managed to get a new host, he would have become extraordinarily powerful from eating that many souls. 

Shit. She had to find out what had happened. 

As Brand watched Summers get dragged away, she saw him struggling, kicking out at random. 

Or maybe not so random, because one of his kicks shattered the lock to David Haller’s compartment. 

Maybe it was Summers who’d destroyed the train. He was definitely powerful enough to do it, and there was some damage to the rear compartment that could have been caused by his eye beams. He had more motive than Farouk and more focus than Haller. Abigail would just have to wait and see if he got out of the compartment he’d been locked in. 

At that moment, as her gaze drifted over the other feeds, a movement in the dining car caught her eye. 

One of the waitresses was Ruth Aldine. She must have been projecting an illusion to hide her lack of eyes from the others in the dining car, but telepathic illusion didn’t work over video. It was definitely her. 

Aldine wasn’t someone Abigail had ever understood. With telepathy, telekinesis, and precognition, she was powerful but not _very_ powerful, and she didn’t have what would be called a forceful personality. 

As a teenager, her future would have been clear to anyone who looked at her: either a quiet life and a normal job, or acting as faithful backup to a B-list superhero team. 

But at seventeen, she’d had a flight of madness, and had started dating David Haller. 

Brand had chalked it up to insecurity on Ruth’s part: dating David had probably been a cry for attention. Back when she’d found out about the relationship, all Abigail had done was put together an action plan for when the relationship inevitably failed and David flew off the hook. 

Except that they hadn’t broken up, and by the age of twenty-three they had been married. 

Did Aldine know that her husband was here? Was this a rescue attempt? 

Or had Summers recruited her to help him against Farouk? Charles Xavier had died years ago, Jean Grey and Emma Frost were either dead or in hiding; in order to find a telepath to help against the Shadow King, Summers would have had to look for other options, and Aldine wouldn’t have been a bad choice. 

Walking with feigned casualness, Aldine left the dining car and walked past the passenger compartments. She stopped when she saw the broken lock. 

*

Ruth reached out, tracing the remains of the lock with her fingertips. When she’d walked this way earlier on her way to the dining car, this lock had been intact, she was sure of it. 

Something had happened. 

Instinctively she reached out for Scott’s mind to tell him that she’d found something to investigate, before she remembered that he was wearing a telepathy shield, so she’d have to find him later for an in-person catch-up. 

She placed her palm on the door to the compartment and pushed it open. 

The door swung inwards and she saw David, and all the tension of her mission fell away entirely because David was here and he was alive. 

He wasn’t well. 

David had always been thin, had always worn his hair long, but now he was skeletal, his hair falling to his waist in black tangles. 

How was this real? If she had eyes, she would have wept. 

He was alive. She’d seen him die for no reason at all, but somehow he was alive. 

“David,” she said softly, kneeling beside him. 

He flinched away. 

“No – no it’s me. It’s Ruth. I – I’ll get you out of here. I’ll make Farouk pay for whatever he’s done to you.” 

There was something very wrong with David’s eyes. They were still the same blue and green that she’d always loved, but behind them there was nothing. No matter the state of David’s mind, even when he was possessed by an alter his gaze had always carried an energy, a presence that was gone now, replaced by blankness. 

There was no recognition in those eyes. The spark was gone. 

“What did he do to you?” she whispered, no longer expecting an answer. His mind was still there, but its walls were impenetrable to her and there were no surface thoughts for her to read. 

“Please, please remember me. I’m your wife. Do you remember our wedding? The synagogue? It was beautiful.” David wasn’t wearing his wedding ring; of course he wasn’t, Farouk wouldn’t have cared about something like that. Ruth held up her own left hand, showed David the silver band and the engagement ring with its single diamond. David had crafted that diamond himself, created by rearranging the molecules from a lock of his own hair. 

Before today, she’d thought it was the last piece she had left of him. She had never quite been able to count the blood and bone that was all that remained after his apparent death, and now that she thought of it, she suspected that had been her precognition, trying to tell her that the torn-up flesh she’d buried wasn’t her husband at all. 

*

The woman with the blindfold asked him to remember her. 

He didn’t remember her. 

She started to sob. “They – they took you away from me. Might as well have killed you, you’re gone, there’s nothing left.” 

Was she talking about him? He wasn’t sure if she had it right. Perhaps she had mistaken him for someone else. 

“God,” the woman said, “After everything we went through…” 

She was still looking at him. Even with the blindfold, he somehow knew that she was looking at him like he was the most important thing in the universe, and he didn’t know why. 

“I’m not going to lose you again,” she told him. “Once I’ve dealt with Farouk, I’ll come back for you, alright? I don’t know how much of you is still in there, but I’m going to get you out of here. I’ll look after you.” 

*

Ruth Aldine squared her shoulders and left the compartment, closing the door softly behind her. 

Then she set her jaw with determination. 

Brand followed her through the CCTV until she reached the compartment Summers had been shut in. Aldine’s telekinesis made short work of the lock, and then she and Summers caught each other up with what was going on. 

Then Summers suggested cutting the CCTV, and Aldine nodded. 

The screen cut to static. 

Dammit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ruth found Scott with precognition instead of telepathy because of the telepathy shield he was wearing.
> 
> Songs: Thor, Conspiracy to Commit Treason, **Sigyn**.


	3. Static and Dust

Abigail made some calls and called in a favour with Hank McCoy. He did his best to get what little data he could out of the remaining CCTV, but whatever Aldine had done, she’d messed it up pretty good. 

In the end, what she got was hardly worth the conversation with Hank as he made a few pitiful flirtations in an attempt to get her to take him back. All Brand had to show for it was a couple of seconds-long clips. 

David Haller wandering the carriages as the other passengers stared at him in obvious confusion. 

Audio of Aldine and Summers talking about accessing something. 

A short clip of guards dragging Haller to the back of the train, throwing him down before Farouk. 

Farouk, looking down at Haller and smiling. 

That was it. No more information for Abigail to piece together what had happened. 

Four suspects. Four motives. 

Farouk, destroying the train as a side effect of his attempt at taking Haller as a vessel. 

Summers, trying to stop Farouk. 

Haller, lashing out, the last vestiges of his sanity ripped to shreds. 

Aldine, as vengeance for what Farouk had done to her husband. 

Four suspects, and none of their bodies had been among the wreckage. 

Deliberately or by accident, any of them could have done it. 

But Brand didn’t have a clue which one. 

She watched and re-watched the footage, trying to find something she had missed in Farouk’s glee and Summers’ determination and Aldine’s grief and Haller’s vacant gaze. 

There was nothing new for her to find. 

*

Farouk sat in his private compartment and smiled. Soon, David Haller’s body would be his, and he would become the most powerful mutant on the planet. Young and strong, and with powers he could use to make himself live forever. 

*

Scott prepared himself. He had to stop Farouk, he had to save the people on this train. The X-Men were over and he wasn’t as young as he’d once been, but he couldn’t let Farouk win. 

*

Ruth wondered if David would ever remember her. Farouk had taken everything from him, stripped him of his sanity and left him in a cell until he could be used. 

Whatever happened, she’d make Farouk suffer for what he’d done. Then she’d free David, take her husband somewhere safe, and build a life for the two of them together. 

*

He sat on the floor in front of the old man and tried to remember. Who had that woman been? 

She meant something to him. 

Not remembering her made him feel ashamed and he didn’t know why. 

He reached for the memories but they slipped through his fingers like dust. 

All he had were the short flashes of his past, there and then gone. Not enough to piece himself together. 

*

Ruth and Scott separated again, trying to find a way to slow the train. Neither of them were strong enough to fight Farouk and win, and if they went after him directly then he’d likely use innocent people as shields. Their best hope was to slow the train enough to evacuate the civilians. Save as many people as they could while simultaneously depriving Farouk of the energy he needed to take David. 

Ruth knew that the logical thing to do would be to send David off the train first, and knew that she would likely have to do that. 

She couldn’t bear the idea of being parted from him again. If they got separated he wouldn’t be able to survive out in the world on his own, not now that he was like – that. 

It was at this moment that the people in her carriage started screaming. 

Some died quickly, motionless, but the rest writhed in agony. Farouk had begun to feast. 

Ruth fell to her knees. Unlike Scott, she wore no telepathy shield, and had been counting on her abilities to hide her and keep her safe. She had never counted on Farouk trying to kill her directly. 

He wasn’t even trying to kill her specifically. He’d simply reached for every unshielded mind on the train. 

It took every ounce of her strength to keep him out of her head. She tried to stand, to walk to the next compartment, to get to David and get him out of there. Perhaps if they jumped from the train, her telekinesis could cushion their fall. 

It was no use. It felt like her head was in a vice. With every soul he consumed, Farouk grew stronger. She managed to rise to one knee, but she fell just as quickly. 

*

In the back of the train, Farouk sat contentedly, a wide smile on his face. He was going to win. 

David Haller stared up at him. Around him there was a buzz of telepathic ability, a pressure building around his mind from souls entering the psychic plane, until suddenly, like a cloud moving away from the sun, he was staring up at Farouk with clear eyes. 

David gasped, his memories dragged back into the light, jumbled and messy but there, present, he could touch them now, he could understand. Voices filled his head. 

His alters. They’d been gone for so long, but they were back now. 

David looked up at Farouk, who had closed his eyes in bliss. “What have you done?” he asked, and Farouk didn’t even hear him. 

David stood, his muscles weak from disuse. Barefoot, he walked out towards the front of the train. He had to find Ruth. His powers felt shaky in his mind, but even if they couldn’t stop Farouk, at least they could die together. 

He entered a carriage. It was full of the still and quiet dead. 

In front of him, the man who’d entered his compartment before. He found a few relevant memories. The man was older than when David had last seen him. 

“You…” his voice was cracked with disuse. “I knew you.” He frowned. “Scott?” 

“Yes,” said Scott, “You did know me. Where are you going?” 

“I have to find Ruth. You?” 

“I’m going to stop Farouk. I don’t suppose you can do anything for the passengers? Shield their minds? I think some of the ones in the other carriages are still alive.” 

David shook his head. “They’re not. Or at least, they’re so far gone that it makes no difference. What you’ve seen is just death throes. And I’m still not – not quite back. My powers won’t count for much right now.” 

They stepped past each other. 

“If you can’t stop him,” said David, “I hope Farouk kills you quickly. It hurts when he does it slow.” 

“The same for you,” said Scott. 

Not turning back, each went on their way. 

*

Farouk was laughing when Scott found him, his eyes closed. 

Scott thought about how they were at the back of the train, and thought about how fast the train was going, and how strong David and Ruth’s mental shields might be, and what kind of distraction would stop Farouk from trying to take either one of them as his new host. 

His hand on his visor, he shattered the glass of the observation window, letting in the cold night air. 

As the stars looked down on him, Scott charged at Farouk, momentum carrying both men out of the jagged hole in the compartment and into the open air. 

They grappled, tumbling over the track as the train sped away from them. Farouk’s hand groped for Scott’s visor and he heard his force beams hit something that screeched, knew instinctively that they had hit the back of the train, but there was no time to think of that as he forced his head down towards the man he was wrestling with, and then Farouk didn’t have a face anymore and it was all over. 

*

David entered the front compartment of the train. Something was making Farouk panic, and he was tearing at David’s mind, desperate to get in, but the attempt was clumsy and David shrugged him off. His mind was broken and battered, but it was his. It always would be. 

Ruth knelt in front of him, collapsed. Blood trickled from her nose, and patches of dark red showed on her blindfold. 

David knelt and touched her gently on the shoulder, and they held each other tight. 

“I’m sorry,” he said softly. “I’m sorry that I was gone. I’m sorry that we lost years we could have had together. But I remember now.” 

“It’s alright,” said Ruth, smiling. “We’re together.” 

David kissed her. 

Then there was an ungodly screech and the whole room was turning. They wrapped each other in telekinesis as the train twisted off the tracks and the room rolled over and over. 

Everything was chaos.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It doesn’t matter how many souls Farouk eats; if his brain’s destroyed without claiming a new host, he’s dead.
> 
> Songs: **White Noise** , **Losing Track** , Expert Testimony, Red Signal, Ragnarok I: Runaway, Ragnarok II: The Calling, **Ragnarok III: Strange Meeting** , Ragnarok IV: Jormungandr, **Ragnarok V: End of the Line**.


	4. Follow-up

Determined to find something, anything else to tell her what had happened, Abigail had the whole length of the train track searched. 

The search turned up a body. The face and most of the head were gone, but the clothes were Amahl Farouk’s. 

At a guess, she’d say that Scott Summers had done it. 

Abigail decided then and there that she wouldn’t arrest him. She put in her report that it had likely been self-defence, though there wasn’t a shred of proof for that. 

After a bit of digging, Scott turned up alive, though he was sporting a broken arm and numerous bruises. Abigail tracked him down for a talk, and while it was good to know for certain what had happened to cause the crash, it still left her with loose ends. 

David Haller was still missing. 

Ruth Aldine hadn’t made contact with Scott after the train crash. 

Both of them in the wind. 

*

The sounds of the crash had made David’s head hurt, but the cushion of his and Ruth’s telekinesis had left them unharmed by the wreck. 

The carriage was on its roof, so they stepped out of a shattered window, carefully avoiding the broken glass. 

Snow crunched under David’s feet as he looked out across the cold white landscape. The wind caught the back of his throat. “We made it,” he said breathlessly, “We actually made it.” 

They were clinging to each other, not yet ready to let go of each other. 

“You weren’t sure if we’d make it?” asked Ruth. 

“I know –” said David, “I usually have a plan. But all I could really do was try and make sure we both survived, and even then – my powers are still coming back to me. Not exactly reliable when you’re risking your life.” He looked around at the lightening sky. “Well, at least we crashed somewhere beautiful.” 

*

_Two months later…_

David had made breakfast. 

Ruth knew that it was something of an apology; he’d spent the previous afternoon lost in his own memories, and hadn’t responded the first few times she’d spoken to him. 

He was getting better, though. She had him back, could hold him and know he was there. 

As they sat down to eat, David said, “Abigail Brand is looking for us.” 

Ruth smiled. “She’s not going to find us.” 

“I don’t think I want her to find us.” 

She sipped her tea. “So we stay dead?” 

David clinked his mug with hers and smiled. “I’ve been dead half a dozen times now. I think I’m going to enjoy this death the most.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes self-care is letting everyone assume that you and your wife are dead so that you can live your lives without anyone bothering you while you recover from years of traumatic experiences.
> 
> Song: Terminus.


End file.
